As times get lean for alternative newsweeklys, their penchant to dispose of any and all journalistic class, fact-based reporting, or positive counterpoints to their dubious assertions goes out the window in lieu of mercilessly ripping into entire segments of artists without a single word of objectivity or credit where credit is due.
When it comes to neotraditional singing duos, The Secret Sisters are regarded at the very top of the discipline. However that hasn’t exactly won them the fame and comfort that is usually reserved for the esteemed and elite of a medium.
The hope still is that country music legend Loretta Lynn is on the road to recovery and rehabilitation after suffering a stroke on May 5th, but she’s not ready to return to the stage just yet. Word came down on Wednesday (6-21) that Loretta would be canceling some upcoming performances.
At the moment, we don’t have any motive, or any solid information on why Jacob Stockdale would decide to gun down two of his family members before attempting to take his own life. Though the public can surmise about a motive, there was no evidence or prior knowledge of trouble within the family.
What started out to be the idea for a heavy metal album of Outlaw country covers by DevilDriver frontman Dez Fafara has apparently turned into a monster project that may include dozens of songs and as many as 25 guest appearances. Though the songs will be country, the approach to most of the songs will be metal.
Look, is it possible for us to make too much of this situation over country music artist Lindsey Ell having a radio appearance last Friday canceled on a CBS-owned radio station because she’s in a relationship with rival iHeartMedia on-air personality Bobby Bones? Yes, it is. But I’m not sure we’re there yet.
Both sides of Texas country are well-represented in upcoming artist John Baumann’s third official release, Proving Grounds. You don’t have to go digging for a bio on Baumann to find out what he’s all about, it’s all articulated right there in his songs.
One would be hard pressed to find another industry that is as insular, antiquated, and downright embarrassing as the one that is in charge of managing the affairs of mainstream country radio. Despite checks and balances that are supposed to be in place, the amount of backroom deals and dirty practices is unconscionable.
Steve Earle isn’t just your average aging thinning-hair post-mainstream relevancy Americana dude who was kind of big in the 80’s. At 62-years-old, he’s probably the youngest guy who can legitimately claim honest ties to the original country music Outlaw movement of the 70’s.
Two members of the Stockdale Family Band are dead, and the third is in a local hospital after suffering a self-inflicted gunshot wound to the head in an incident Thursday afternoon (6-15). 25-year-old Jacob Stockdale is suspected of shooting his 21-year-old brother James Stockdale and 54-year-old mother Kathryn Stockdale.
Zephaniah Ohora is quickly revealing himself as one of the greatest country music discoveries in 2017, and so there’s no better place for him at the moment than leading a collection of the Top 25 Current Songs for Saving Country Music’s official Spotify playlist.
Chris Stapleton’s second solo record From A Room: Vol. 1 has officially shipped a sum total of 500,000 units and streaming-equivalent credits to become the first country album in all of 2017 so far to officially go Gold according to the RIAA. The certification was award to the album on June 8th, only a month after the release date.
It’s not just talent that sifts certain artists to the top of the heap of their discipline, it is timing. And Jason Isbell is one of the defining artists of our era because he is Southern, and enlightened, and can understand the perspective of the poor Southern man, as well as the faraway intellectual.
My life took a devastating and decidedly palpable turn for the worse when I cued up Shania Twain’s long-awaited new single, “Life’s About To Get Good.” Somewhere Robert “Mutt” Lange is cackling like the Wicked Witch of the West. Did someone pull a practical joke on Shania in the studio? Because this thing’s a stinker, and it’s all the fault of the production.
Apologies if you came here looking to replenish your 3rd generation iPod with a fresh platoon of booty shakers. That’s not what this practice is all about. Feel good songs are just fine and help fleet us through the tiresome days, but when we talk about the “Best Songs,” were talking about songs that deliver moments that can change entire lives.
When Brad Paisley included a song called “Gold All Over The Ground” on his recent album Love and War, we thought it was just a one-off occasion where one of today’s country artists took a poem from Johnny Cash and turned it into a song. The poem “Gold All Over The Ground” was first composed […]
Let’s call it what it is at this point: Steve Earle is going scorched earth. Ahead of the release of his latest album So You Wanna Be An Outlaw, the 62-year-old alt-country songwriter isn’t just refusing to pull punches, he’s looking for targets. His latest are modern country, Oasis frontman Noel Gallagher, and the new partner of his former wife, Hayes Carll.
“Hedley’s initiation into the Third Man family solidifies not only the end of Bro Country’s stranglehold on the country music industry, but also Third Man’s place as the greatest country label on the planet,” says the Jack White-owned label after signing Nashville fixture Josh Hedley to the label.
Sturgill Simpson is such an enigma, to see his name crop up as the producer on the album from someone else is shocking and intriguing. Stugill has made a career out of saying “no” to reporters, industry professionals, and opportunities some artists would kill for. So how and why did he say “yes” to Tyler Childers?
Oh man are these some stinkers. Not only does an elite and highly-trained group of mainstream country artists seem to be like devoted experts at defining new lows for the genre, in 2017 the amount of non-country-ness of some of these “country” songs is so off the charts, it’s like they’re purposely challenging each other.
